said Anna, smiling.

“No, do tell me why it is one can’t go to sleep, and one can’t help being bored?”

“To sleep well one ought to work, and to enjoy oneself one ought to work too.”

“What am I to work for when my work is no use to anybody? And I can’t and won’t knowingly make a pretense about it.”

“You’re incorrigible,” said Stremov, not looking at her, and he spoke again to Anna. As he rarely met Anna, he could say nothing but commonplaces to her, but he said those commonplaces as to when she was returning to Petersburg, and how fond Countess Lidia Ivanovna was of her, with an expression which suggested that he longed with his whole soul to